1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a vehicle control device and vehicle control method that suppress an increase in the driving force of a vehicle in response to erroneous operation of an accelerator pedal.
2. Description of Related Art
There has been a situation that an accelerator pedal is depressed in mistake for a brake pedal to accelerate a vehicle against an intention. A vehicle control device described in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 61-190135 (JP 61-190135 A) is proposed as a technique for avoiding such a situation. The vehicle control device described in JP 61-190135 A suppresses an increase in the driving force of a vehicle by, for example, reducing the fuel supply amount of an engine when a depression force on an accelerator pedal or a depression speed of the accelerator pedal exceeds a set value while driving at a high gear ratio of a transmission.
Generally, a depression force on an accelerator pedal and a depression speed of the accelerator pedal in normal driving are respectively smaller than a depression force on a brake pedal and a depression speed of the brake pedal at the time when a vehicle is rapidly stopped. Therefore, recognizing strong depression of the accelerator pedal as depression of the accelerator pedal in mistake for the brake pedal is almost reasonable. However, a driver who seeks sporty running may intentionally strongly depress the accelerator pedal. Therefore, if strong depression of the accelerator pedal is uniformly determined as erroneous depression to thereby suppress an increase in driving force, such a driver's request is impaired, and the flexibility of driving may be limited.